fnatic exact revenge on Titan

fnatic are through to the ESEA Season 18 grand final after seeing off Titan on two maps (16-10 on de_mirage and 16-9 on de_cache.

Fresh off a 2-0 victory over mousesports, fnatic looked determined to get revenge for the disappointing 0-2 defeat the day before. The first two maps of the series, de_mirage and de_cache, were exactly the same fnatic had defeated mouz on, so Markus "pronax" Wallsten's men went into the match trying to repeat the winning formula from the previous match.

Titan actually came out the brighter by winning the pistol round as Terrorists with a B push, but the French team were caught off-guard in the first anti-eco round while trying to enter the same bombsite. After taking a 3-1 lead, fnatic then dropped one round thanks to some overaggressive play and another one because of a triple kill from Cédric "RpK" Guipouy.

Until the end of the first half, it was a back-and-forth game as neither side could distance themselves from the other, with Titan eventually securing a narrow 8-7 lead, which they would not be able to hold on to for too long as a quad kill from Olof "olofmeister" Kajbjer in the pistol round levelled the game.

After picking up the two anti-eco rounds, fnatic continued on a winning note and outplayed Titan in the first gun round, which destroyed the Frenchmen's economy. Kévin "Ex6TenZ" Droolans's side would go on to win two rounds to put an end to fnatic's streak, but that did little in the way of stopping the Swedish giants.

Titan put up a good fight but were unable to close it out photo hltv.org

The map that followed was de_cache, where fnatic got off to a flying start by winning the opening five rounds as CT. Titan then responded in convincing fashion and won five rounds of their own to force a timeout out of Wallsten. The pep talk paid off for fnatic, who managed to win two more rounds before the break.

Titan were now enjoying an 8-7 lead and were about to play on the highly-rated CT side of the map, but they failed to capitalise on that situation as they allowed fnatic to regain control of the proceedings following a strong mid push towards b in the pistol round.

The first gun round also went fnatic's way in what appeared to be a repeat of the first map. Titan still managed to win one round to keep their opponents under pressure, but the Swedish team quickly sealed the deal to advance to the title decider against Virtus.pro.